Preparing Schools for the Year 2000. The Impact of Technology on America's Classrooms in the Decade Ahead.

O'Donnell, Peggy

This document reports the findings of a study which used the Delphi Technique to survey the attitudes of a representative group of professionals toward developments in the curriculum, the design of instructional materials, and the use of new technology by classroom teachers at the kindergarten through ninth grade levels. Participants included classroom teachers, school library media specialists, administrators, college education/library media faculty, and representatives from state and national government agencies and associations. The respondents discussed the skills and subjects that will be emphasized in schools over the next 10 years in the context of their own predictions for the future world environment, and described their visions of the classroom in the year 2000. Participants also indicated the skills and subjects that will be emphasized over the next decade and into the following century, and considered which new technologies will play an important role in the classroom by the year 2000. Finally, participants expressed concern over equal access to technology in the future, and also expressed varying degrees of enthusiasm about the growth of educational technology. Opinions were gathered in 3 rounds; 78 educators participated in the first round and 50 remained for the final round. A diagram depicting a classroom as it might look in the year 2000 is included. (EW)